Solargraphy Baseline Exposure Time

[aaronmichael]

Tried posting this in the Alternative forum on here but didn't get any responses yet. Was wondering if anyone in this forum could help me out with a question I have. Here goes:

Hello All,

Tried to figure this out before posting but couldn't seem to find anything. I recently came across some solargraphy image and really want to give it a shot. I was simply wondering, what is the shortest exposure time to get an image on the photo paper without developing? While doing my looking around, I've seen the famous 6 month shots but I've also seen one's that have only taken a day. That's quite a large range. I realize that the exposure time will have a lot to do with pinhole diameter. However, I'm sure .25mm - .50mm difference between pinholes sizes wouldn't make THAT much of a difference in exposure times. I'm sure there has to be some kind of baseline exposure time to get a visible image on the paper? Does photo paper not "overexpose" without developer? Any help would be great, thanks.

 

[rawhead]

I just want to say: thinking about "exposure times" is just simply too ridiculous when it comes to solargraphy. You just make a decent pinhole. You set the cam in place. let it Expose for however long you like it. The end.

Yes, you can expose just one day and get something:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rawhead/4125543313/

 

[aaronmichael]

I just want to say: thinking about "exposure times" is just simply too ridiculous when it comes to solargraphy. You just make a decent pinhole. You set the cam in place. let it Expose for however long you like it. The end.

Yes, you can expose just one day and get something:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rawhead/4125543313/

Thank you so much for the reply and opinion! Doesn't seem like too many people have much to say about the subject. I set a film canister pinhole camera out a couple days ago and couldn't wait any longer and pulled it out today (a Christmas present to myself). Low and behold there was an image on the paper! I scanned it, did some basic editing, and put it up on flickr. I made a couple new cameras that take a much larger piece of photo paper and am going to set it out tomorrow hopefully.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronmichael/5291407866/

 

[bvy]

I've gotten images in as short as one day using a pinhole and exposing directly to Ilford paper.

Might be worth mentioning that you don't need to use a pinhole. I used a homemade lens/cigar box combination and got this in just about three hours:
http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=913845

The aperture is about half an inch and focal length (depth of the box) is about four inches. So that's ~f/8. Again the exposure was direct to Ilford paper.

 

[aaronmichael]

I've gotten images in as short as one day using a pinhole and exposing directly to Ilford paper.

Might be worth mentioning that you don't need to use a pinhole. I used a homemade lens/cigar box combination and got this in just about three hours:
http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=913845

The aperture is about half an inch and focal length (depth of the box) is about four inches. So that's ~f/8. Again the exposure was direct to Ilford paper.

Hm, interesting. Thank you very much for the reply. I got too anxious waiting for a reply so I tried it out using a film container pinhole and exposed for two days. Got a decent result but decided I wanted to expose for longer so I set up two new cameras on my roof. The main problem I have now is keeping water out of them. The actual camera is waterproof but the section I have cut out for the pinhole is not.